The antibiotic, thienamycin, is obtained by growing strains of Streptomyces cattleya microorganism in suitable aqueous nutrient media under controlled conditions. The present invention is directed to the methods for recovering the antibiotic in substantially pure form.
A process for the isolation of the antibiotic thienamycin is reported in U.S. Pat. No. 3,950,357. Said process utilizes solid resin ion exchangers.
Moreover, thienamycin is a hydrophilic, amphoteric compound which cannot be extracted from aqueous solutions by simple organic solvents. Hence, simple solvent extraction which is highly applicable to the isolation of penicillin and other antibiotics cannot be readily applied here.